‘Living A Dream’ – How Teshya Noelani Alo’s Lifetime In Grappling Led Her To ONE Championship’s Global Stage
For Teshya Noelani Alo, reaching ONE Championship was never the result of a single decision or a sudden shift in direction.
Long before her name appeared on a global fight card, the 28-year-old Hawaiian sensation was already immersed in combat sports. Wrestling, judo, and eventually Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu were not phases she cycled through, but layers that accumulated over time.
On Friday, January 23, in U.S. primetime, that lifelong process brings Alo to ONE Fight Night 39: Rambolek vs. Dayakaev on Prime Video at Bangkok’s Lumpinee Stadium, where she will face 18-year-old American prodigy Helena Crevar in a bantamweight submission grappling contest.
The matchup places her on the biggest stage of her career, but it also reconnects her with a familiar opponent from much earlier in her journey. Ahead of her ONE Championship debut, learn more about Alo.
An Argument Over A Pencil Starts The Journey
Alo was raised in Honolulu on the island of Oahu in a close-knit household where movement, discipline, and competition were part of daily life.
The oldest of six siblings, she grew up in an environment where physicality came naturally long before organized training entered the picture.
She first stepped onto the wrestling mat at seven years old, with judo entering her life soon thereafter.
Her introduction to wrestling did not begin in a gym or at a tournament, however. It began at home.
A childhood argument with her sister, Teniya, caught her father’s attention. A former high school wrestler himself, he recognized the mechanics immediately and decided to act.
Alo recalled:
“My sister and I were actually fighting over a Hello Kitty pencil. My dad actually wrestled when he was in high school, and he said it looked like you’re wrestling. So, he started putting us into classes and teaching us some of the takedowns.”
The family patriarch began teaching both his daughters basic fundamentals, eventually bringing them into organized wrestling.
Immediately, he became his daughters’ coach – a role he continues to hold – and the sport quickly embedded itself into the girls’ everyday life.
Reflecting on those early days, Alo said:
“He was our first coach and currently still is, and we just fell in love, and at that same time, he took us to wrestling practice.”
Early Competition, Early Adversity
Competition followed quickly, and so did perspective.
Alo entered her first local wrestling tournament alongside her sister, stepping into an environment that was unfamiliar, physical, and unforgiving. The outcome left a lasting imprint.
She remembered:
“My sister won, but I actually got slammed. I got second [place], and for some reason, my dad asked me if I wanted to stop because I was crying. I got slammed on my head because [my opponent] was a very strong boy. But I was just like, ‘I need to beat this boy back.'”
That moment reframed how she understood competition.
Instead of retreating from discomfort, she leaned into it, choosing persistence over protection – a decision that would shape her path long before titles followed.
Alo explained:
“I just trained my butt off and came back. I beat that boy, and then I went to nationals. I just started winning – I [started winning] states, I started winning nationals, and then I started winning internationally, and it just grew from there.”
Competing In A Male-Dominated Scene
As Alo advanced beyond local events, structural limitations became impossible to ignore.
Girls’ divisions were scarce in Hawaii, and she was routinely placed into brackets with boys by default. At practices, regional tournaments, and national events, she was often the only girl on the mat.
The challenge extended beyond physicality. Competing in spaces not designed for her required emotional control and resilience at an unusually young age.
She said:
“When I first started, I was the only girl in practice. I was the only girl at all the nationals. It was just very difficult for me to win anything.”
Geography added another layer of difficulty.
Opportunities were infrequent, travel was costly, and progress depended on patience rather than repetition.
Alo added:
“It was really expensive having to travel, and we didn’t have tournaments every single weekend. We had tournaments maybe once every other month, and again, I was usually the only girl in an all-boys bracket getting beat up.”
Navigating Hostility & Learning Composure Early
Familiarity with opponents was unavoidable in a small competitive scene, and repeated matchups sometimes bred tension.
For instance, during her early judo years, Alo encountered moments where hostility surfaced openly – experiences that tested her composure as much as her technique.
She recalled one incident vividly:
“We were challenging the same people every weekend. So, this boy that I beat, the next weekend when we had to compete again, he grabbed me, pulled me close, and said, ‘You suck, you can’t throw me.’
“I was caught so off guard, and I started crying, just because I had never experienced that before. But then something kind of flipped, and I just went crazy on him. Some boys are very mean, but some boys appreciate the technique that I used.”
Choosing A Long-Term Relationship With Grappling
Alongside wrestling and judo, Alo was also introduced to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu at a young age.
The Hawaiian trained in the discipline for a short period, but she ultimately stepped away for more than a decade. She instead decided to focus on wrestling and judo, where competition opportunities and skill development aligned more closely with her goals at that time.
When Alo reached her teenage years, the results began to match the work. She captured many accolades including four high school state wrestling titles, a USA Wrestling Freestyle National High School Title, and a FILA Cadet World Championship. What’s more, she was a two-time Team USA member.
In judo, Alo claimed multiple national youth titles including three gold medals in the USA Judo Junior Olympic National Championships and a gold medal in the Pan American Judo Championships. She was quietly building a résumé that spanned disciplines long before Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu seriously entered the picture.
Judo, however, was never something she pursued in isolation. It was a discipline she used intentionally – a way to sharpen balance, timing, and transitions that carried directly into her wrestling.
As the sport’s rule set evolved, particularly with restrictions on leg attacks, that relationship began to change.
She explained:
“A lot of the rules, I felt like they were making it toward wrestlers because it kind of did become like a wrestling match. But the sport of judo is to throw, trip, and balance. So, I was like, ‘Okay, well, I’m out. I need my legs.'”
Years later, during the COVID-19 pandemic, gyms were closed throughout North America, and Alo was looking for something fitness-related to help lose some unwanted weight.
That’s when Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu re-entered her life, but it did so in an unexpected way.
Alo explained:
“I saw this guy teaching jiu-jitsu on the beach, literally on the beach in a cabana, and I was like, ‘That’s a little weird.’ My mom signed me up, basically, and I went on my first day and fell in love.”
A Familiar Rival On The Global Stage
Thanks to her dedication and phenomenal grappling background, Alo has grown in the BJJ space at lightning speed. She has also performed well in competition, even winning a trio of ADCC Opens in 2025.
But in her ONE Championship debut, she will face a familiar foe in Crevar, who happened to be her first-ever opponent in a no-gi BJJ tournament. The Hawaiian did not study the bracket or fully understand the rules at the time, and she ultimately lost the match due to a penalty.
Now, that same name reappears, but it’s not in a small gym. It’s under the bright lights of the historic Lumpinee Stadium in the world’s largest martial arts organization.
For Alo, the moment is not framed by revenge or validation. It is framed by perspective.
She said:
“I’m basically living a dream. I’m so excited for this match.”
